Action plan on equity, diversity and inclusion

Strong institutional leadership, with the support of both internal and external stakeholders, will facilitate the culture change needed to achieve inclusive excellence at Canadian universities. Universities Canada is committed to supporting our members’ ongoing efforts to create equitable, diverse and inclusive campuses.

Universities Canada is collaborating with member universities and stakeholders from the government, private and community sectors to achieve the following four outcomes through ten specific actions.

The action plan will be reviewed annually.

Action plan

Capacity building and culture change

Expected outcome

Increased capacity at Canadian universities to integrate equity, diversity and inclusion in their teaching, research and governance.

Supporting actions

1. Build institutional capacity to support an equitable, diverse and inclusive organizational culture.

2. Build institutional capacity and culture to recruit diverse students, staff, faculty and administrators, and support their success.

Measurable progress

Expected outcome

Increased availability of results from equity, diversity and inclusion initiatives to inform institutional practices and public policy development.

Supporting actions

4. Conduct a regular survey of member institutions and make quantitative and qualitative data available for benchmarking and comparative analysis.

5. Have members, on an annual basis, re-affirm their institutional commitment to the Inclusive Excellence Principles.

6. Foster the replication and scaling-up of best practices.

Policy development

Expected outcome

Increased engagement in national public policy conversations to provide thought leadership on equity, diversity and inclusion.

Supporting actions

7. Position university experts as thought leaders in national conversations on equity, diversity and inclusion.

8. Raise awareness among government, private and community sector stakeholders of the Inclusive Excellence Principles and collaborate on activities to implement them.

9. Recognize successful university leaders.

Federal investment

Expected outcome

Increased federal support to advance equity, diversity and inclusion at Canadian universities.

Supporting action

10. Promote investments in the K-12 pipeline, in student aid, mobility and work-integrated learning opportunities, scholarships, research grants, and programming to enhance and scale-up progress in achieving Inclusive Excellence at Canadian universities.

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